It can be reasonably argued that those large economic development projects would not have gone forward in Fall River over the past couple of years without the city and state providing a major incentive in the form of tax increment finance agreements, popularly known as TIFs.

“When it’s a decision between two similar locations, (TIFs) are going to make a difference,” said Todd Blount, president of Blount Fine Foods, which moved from Rhode Island to Fall River after receiving a TIF in 2003.

In exchange for a period of reduced property taxes, Blount’s company had to commit to creating 53 new jobs and a $10 million investment in infrastructure. Blount said the business met those commitments, including the 75 additional jobs and additional $10 million investment the company promised when it received a second TIF in 2013 to expand its operations in Fall River.

“There is a large capital investment in these TIFs,” said Blount, who added that the tax abatements are helpful for businesses when they are investing millions of dollars to build new facilities or expand existing ones.

Critics often lambaste business incentive packages such as TIFs and state investment tax credits as corporate welfare, but the reality is that municipalities across Massachusetts have come to rely on them as an important economic development tool to attract companies and encourage local employers to stay in town and grow.

Since 1994, according to public records, Fall River has approved 69 TIF agreements. Local economic development officials say many of TIFs have helped to create more than 5,000 new jobs and retain more than 6,000 jobs while facilitating more than $417 million in private investment.

“In terms of competition for business, the TIF becomes a very important tool because it helps secure businesses and it’s also an important incentive for local businesses that are looking to expand,” said Kenneth Fiola, Jr., executive vice president of the Fall River Office of Economic Development.

“When you are competing for businesses to locate within your community, you’re competing with other communities that also use the TIF tool,” Fiola said. “Anytime you can save a new business or a local business money in the expansion process, that’s a good thing for business.”

Michael Goodman, a public policy professor and executive director of the Public Policy Center at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, said that TIFs, used judiciously, can be an important resources for communities, especially Gateway Cities such as Fall River that have been harmed by de-industrialization in the global economy.

“That doesn’t mean that every project is wise,” Goodman said. “But on balance, the TIF program has made certain economic development projects possible that otherwise wouldn’t have been possible in these communities.”

A review of the 69 TIFs since 2003 — which have to be approved by the City Council, the city’s TIF Board and the state’s Economic Assistance Coordinating Council — indicates that mostly manufacturers have received tax abatements, usually over a five to ten year period, although there are a handful of agreements that run longer.

While many larger companies such as Amazon, Demoulas Super Markets, Inc., and PrimaCare have received TIFs, a review of the recipients since 1994 shows that several local small businesses have also benefited from the program. They include Mike’s Auto Body, New York Bagel and Portugalia Marketplace.

With few exceptions — such as South Coast Market Place, which will open on the site of the former New Harbour Mall on William S. Canning Boulevard — the city has not been keen to give TIFs to retailers.

“There has been a preference to award TIFs to manufacturing companies or non-retail related companies,” said Fiola, who added that the city has historically frowned upon retail TIFs, especially for national chains that could put local businesses at a steep disadvantage.

A difference in the South Coast Market Place project, officials said, was a recognition that the city was asking the developers to take a chance on a site that did not have a good recent track record of attracting customers. Before it shuttered for good in January 2016, the New Harbour Mall was essentially an empty building with few businesses.

“Within the next 24 to 48 months, we’ll be able to see if the TIFs for Amazon and South Coast Market Place have had a positive impact or not,” said City Councilor Cliff Ponte, who sits on the city’s TIF Board.

Ponte, who sat on the board when it approved the South Coast Market Place TIF, said TIFs can be a unique opportunity to improve and increase economic activity, with some limitations.

“Every time a new business comes to the city, we decide we want to give them a TIF so they can open up shop. I don’t think that’s the best method to go down,” Ponte said. “I think we need to evaluate each TIF and determine how long the TIFs would last.”

Ponte said he considers the TIF’s length to be the most important factor to consider.

Said Ponte, “If they’re going out 10 years, what is going to be the impact on the city’s tax rate, on income generated in 5 to 10 years from now? What kind of growth is there going to be?”

A review of the city’s TIF agreements over the last 23 years shows similar tax abatement schedules. For the first several years, a company will often receive a 100 percent exemption on real estate and personal property taxes. Over the ensuing years, the exemptions decrease, usually in 25-percent increments, until the TIF agreement expires.

To keep their property tax abatements, TIF recipients have to live up to their promises to create jobs and invest money in their facilities. They are required to submit annual reports to the state’s Economic Assistance Coordinating Council.

Along with the annual reporting to the EACC, active TIF projects in Fall River have to provide quarterly reports to the city’s Assessor’s Office, the Mayor’s Office and FROED. Fiola said city officials cross-reference those company reports with documents from the federal Employment and Training Administration.

If a company fails to live up to its commitments, the city can move to decertify the TIF and recoup the lost tax revenue. According to public records, the City of Fall River has decertified 21 TIFS, about 30 percent of all the agreements since 1994. Some of the TIFs were decertified after the companies experienced business downturns and went out of business. According to public records, the city decertified the TIF that Silver Line Building Products Corp., received in 2003. The company had projected 457 new jobs and more than $13 million in new investment, but a major drop in business led the company to lay off hundreds of workers over the ensuing years before it closed its Fall River manufacturing facility for good in July 2009, according to the Herald News archives.

“You never know what’s going to happen. Things happen. It’s business,” said Fiola, who for that reason said he initially advises businesses to provide conservative job creation estimates on their TIF applications.

“It’s better to under-promise and over-deliver,” Fiola said.

Some companies that received TIFs and abided by their agreements have also since closed up shop, such as Quaker Fabric Corporation, which received a TIF in 1995 and went out of business in 2008.

TIF critics may also note that there is nothing stopping a company from leaving Fall River after its TIF runs out, and local officials concede that they are right, though they argue that such cases are rare. Blount added that it often does not make economic sense for a company to relocate after already having invested millions of dollars in its existing facilities and workforce.

“A TIF requires a certain amount of investment and employment so by the time you get to that sixth year, you’re kind of locked in. It’s hard to move,” Blount said.

In addition to promised jobs and new business investment, TIF recipients in Fall River agree to do their best to hire local contractors, vendors and suppliers, and to commit to using “commercially reasonable efforts” to cooperate with the Fall River Career Center and other agencies to recruit and hire qualified Fall River residents.

Fiola said the city expresses “a preference” that TIF recipients hire local contractors and residents, but he conceded that it’s difficult to “hold to their feet to the fire” on those provisions. Labor unions have also lobbed criticisms that Fall River does not mandate union construction labor for TIF projects.

“When every other city does that, then we’ll do that,” Fiola said. “If we’re the only city that’s doing that, then that puts us at a competitive disadvantage. I just can’t afford to do that.”

Ponte said he wants to a stronger emphasis on hiring local contractors in the TIF agreements, as well as rigid scrutiny over each application.

“I think each case in its own merit deserves some attention, deserves some research to determine what kind of benefits there would be for economic growth, what kind of jobs they’re going to create, whether it’s construction jobs or if it’s new jobs once they open, and what kind of impact it’s going to have on the city, taking into consideration the infrastructure as well,” said Ponte, who credited FROED and the city’s legal department with ensuring that the TIFS contain an investment on return for Fall River.

Blount, whose company has entered into TIF-like agreements in several other states, said the City of Fall River signals its willingness to work with and help the business community by its responsiveness and proactive approach to helping companies like Blount Fine Foods to navigate the TIF application process.

“A company like ours just wouldn’t have the resources otherwise to do it by ourselves,” Blount said.

Goodman, who has been a member of the Economic Assistance Coordinating Council since 2003 and said he has literally reviewed “hundreds” of TIFs, said a well-crafted TIF can also benefit the local economy by creating more jobs for local residents, who in turn have money to spend at local businesses